（This artical was originally published by Business Wire, November 21，2016)New facilities in the Middle East, Europe, Australia and Japan will provide comprehensive cloud service offerings, enabling business innovation globally

HANGZHOU, China--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Alibaba Cloud, the cloud computing arm of Alibaba Group, today announced the opening of four new data centers by the end of 2016 in the Middle East (Dubai), Europe, Australia and Japan. As a major milestone of Alibaba Cloud’s global expansion, the new centers will boost its data center network to 14 locations, covering key economic centers around the world. The data center in the Middle East, located in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, commenced initial operations today.Alibaba Cloud’s expansion will provide customers worldwide with improved latency and greater access to its diverse offerings, including data storage and analytics services, enterprise-level middleware, and cloud security services. Strengthening Alibaba Cloud's position as a major global cloud provider, the new data centers will support Alibaba Cloud’s growing client base beyond the current 2.3 million.Through a stronger network of facilities and strategic partnerships, Alibaba Cloud also plans to drive a globalization of innovation. The enhanced cloud capabilities make breakthrough innovation a real possibility with artificial intelligence, deep learning and data analytics.“Alibaba Cloud has contributed significantly to China’s technology advancement, establishing critical commerce infrastructure to enable cross-border businesses, online marketplaces, payments, logistics, cloud computing and big data to work together seamlessly. We want to establish cloud computing as the digital foundation for the new global economy using the opportunities of cloud computing to empower businesses of all sizes across all markets,” said Simon Hu, President of Alibaba Cloud.Evidence of the potential of Alibaba Cloud can be seen during the recently completed 2016 11.11 Global Shopping Festival, where Alibaba Cloud technology supported all of Alibaba’s online marketplaces and facilitated a record-breaking 175,000 transactions per second during peak traffic spikes. The festival showcased the capabilities not only of the cloud, but also a number of other areas, such as virtual reality, thus helping to redefine technological boundaries.“The four new data centers will further expand Alibaba Cloud’s global ecosystem and footprint, allowing us to meet the increasing demand for secure and scalable cloud computing services from businesses and industries worldwide. The true potential of data-driven digital transformation will be seen through globalization and the opportunities brought by the new global economy will become a reality,” said Sicheng Yu, Vice President of Alibaba Group and General Manager of Alibaba Cloud Global.Since its launch, Alibaba Cloud’s technologies have enabled all types of businesses globally, ranging from start-ups to multi-national companies, to benefit from the greater operational and cost efficiency that cloud computing can provide. The new facilities are based in four strategically important trading and economic centers to enable the ambitions to make it easy to do business anywhere.Each of the four will add significant value to the global network and expand horizons.Middle EastAlibaba Cloud will be the first major global public cloud services provider to offer cloud services from a local data center in the Middle East. The opening of the Dubai Data Center is held in conjunction with YVOLV, a joint venture of Alibaba Cloud and Meraas Holdings, a Dubai-based holding company with a portfolio spanning across key economic sectors in the United Arab Emirates. YVOLV will support and drive Dubai’s Smart City vision by leveraging Alibaba Cloud’s sophisticated cloud computing technologies to create new applications and big-data tools for customers in the region.EuropeTo support enterprises in Europe, Alibaba Cloud will partner with Vodafone Germany to open its first data center in Europe. The center is co-located in Vodafone’s data facilities in Frankfurt, Germany, one of the leading technology hubs in Europe with a highly developed infrastructure supporting technological innovation. The facility is well positioned to meet the increasing demand for sophisticated cloud computing services as the region seeks to accelerate the upgrade of its digital infrastructure.AustraliaExtending its global footprint in the Asia-Pacific, Alibaba Cloud will open a new data center in Sydney, Australia by the end of 2016. Alibaba Cloud will bring its most popular cloud services in data storage and processing services, enterprise-level middleware, and cloud security services to the Australian market. A dedicated team will be based in Australia, and build up a cloud ecosystem with local technology partners to drive cloud and big-data business in the region.JapanThe Japan Data Center, hosted by SB Cloud Corporation, a joint venture between Softbank and Alibaba Group, will provide Japanese enterprises with competitive and enhanced public cloud computing services from Alibaba Cloud. With the joint venture, Alibaba Cloud will further expand its cloud computing service platform by leveraging SoftBank’s extensive enterprise customer base in Japan.About Alibaba CloudEstablished in September 2009, Alibaba Cloud (intl.aliyun.com), Alibaba Group’s cloud computing arm, develops highly scalable platforms for cloud computing and data management. It provides a comprehensive suite of cloud computing services to support growing enterprises worldwide, including sellers and other third-party customers and businesses participating in Alibaba Group’s online and mobile commerce ecosystem. Alibaba Cloud is a business of Alibaba Group.